What really happened between HP ex-CEO Mark Hurd and Jodie Fisher?
To this day, only two people know the full truth. But one thing is certain: The deeper you dig, the weirder it gets. — Mark Hurd and Jodie Fisher — Mark Hurd was miffed. It was 2007, two years into his tenure …
Context & Ripple Effects
In March 2009 Fortune put Mark Hurd on its cover as HP's cost-cutting savior (Mark Hurd's moment); eighteen months later he had resigned over the Jodie Fisher matter, HP's board was facing a confirmed shareholder lawsuit over its handling of the exit, and the paper had opened its CEO guessing game.
Within weeks Hurd was in talks to join Oracle, and HP moved to legally block the move. This deep-dive — syndicated the same week under a Wall Street Journal headline stating the accuser said Hurd leaked an HP deal — argues the full truth is known only to Hurd and Fisher, and that each layer of reporting makes the episode stranger rather than clearer.
First-order effects
- Hurd arrives at Oracle with the circumstances of his HP departure still contested in print, including the reported allegation that he leaked details of an HP deal.
- HP's directors, already defendants in a shareholder suit filed after the August resignation, face renewed pressure to explain the gap between their official account and the emerging details.
Second-order effects
- If the leak allegation sticks, the story shifts from a personal-conduct and expense-account matter to one touching HP confidential information, changing what any settlement or non-disclosure terms can plausibly contain.
- Boards at other large companies now have two cautionary data points — HP's opaque exit and the resulting derivative suit — when deciding how much to disclose in a CEO misconduct separation.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, executive-misconduct resignations become litigation events by default: boards that rely on quick, quiet settlements invite shareholder suits, pushing the industry toward independent investigations and fuller disclosure before a successor search begins.
The trend: Corporate boards are losing control of the narrative around CEO-misconduct exits, as sustained press digging and shareholder litigation turn private settlements into open-ended governance sagas.